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Tues. Sept. 15, 2026 – now time is starting to fly by…

By on September 15th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall, long-term food storage

Hot and humid. Still Summer. Getting kinda boring. And it’s staying hot all night again. I was a bit premature thinking Summer was done. More of the same for today, I think.

Did a bunch of small things, mostly auction related yesterday. This being on strike business does free up a lot of time for reading. It’s hurting me in the long run though. IDK if I can keep it up in the face of my natural inclinations.

Today I’ve got auction dropoff to do, so I’ll probably do some auction pickups as well. Nothing too early in the day. Most of them don’t do anything before 10am, and many wait until noon to start their day. I should avoid losing what momentum I have and keep plugging away at it.

And stacking. Grocery shopping time. Time to start replacing the popped cans. I know I’m going to have losses, my storage conditions are far far far from ideal. I just count them as part of the cost of preparedness.

Stack.

nick

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Mon. Sept. 14, 2026 – another week starts

By on September 14th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall

And it will be another hot, moist week. Despite the t-storm possible zone forecast we didn’t get any rain at my house. Maybe someone did. I think we’ve had a mild year so far, but it’s gonna stay warm longer. We’ll see.

Didn’t do much yesterday. Watched some auctions close and even won a few things. Had a little excitement with youths and gunfire, mentioned in yesterday’s comments. Not much really besides reading and sleeping in, and yet, while I feel like it was lost time, part of me doesn’t really regret it enough to get worked up.

Today will be different though. I have more sorting to do to take another load of stuff to my new auctioneer. I have some more vehicle related stuff that I might get to, and I have to do some more work for my client. Haven’t heard back if my ‘clean all the connectors’ strategy worked or failed, and my partner hasn’t gotten back to me about the gear purchase. I need to follow up on both sides.

And who knows, I might get a small thing done around the house too, if I don’t get too distracted.

I’ve got some exploded can goods to clean up, and some stack maintenance to do.

Some of my auction stuff will even count as stacking…

So there is that.

nick

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Sun. Sept. 13, 2026 – I’m sleeping in. I get nothing done when tired

By on September 13th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall, personal

Hot. Still hot. And humid, and we didn’t get any rain. Maybe today? It was sunny like a laser set on broil yesterday and still 82F at 2am. 82F is better than 92F but still hot.

Did my meeting in the morning, a pickup, some chat, a long nap, and some reading. Not a productive day.

Today I’d like to be more productive (as in working on the list) but honestly, laying around reading is probably going to happen.

We’ll see.

Might not even get any stacking in…

you should though.

nick

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Sat. Sept. 12, 2026 – non-prepping hobby day, then a pickup

By on September 12th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall, march to war

Still hot, still really humid. But the national forecast has us in the ‘thunderstorms likely’ zone for the next day or two. Some rain would probably break the streak of hot and humid. And we could use the rain. It is getting cooler at night, which is welcome.

Spent the day not doing much productive work. The anniversary is a difficult one for me and it’s easier to just piddlefart around alternating with reading fiction.

Today will start with my monthly meeting in meatspace. We’ve got financials to review, and hopefully at least a hot wash of our yearly event. One thing I know we should/will talk about is doing our own online event registration, instead of letting the national org do it. It’s easier to let them, but there are issues. It would mean more work for me, but I did most of it a couple of years ago, building a store and the reg forms.

After the meeting, I have one or two pickups to do, then I’ll be home to work on some part of the list. Maybe I’ll get my new Bluray drive installed. I just am not looking forward to the process of digging the PC out of the place it lives under my desk. It’s cramped and hard to work in… and there is a lot of stuff in the way. Probably needs to have the dust and dog hair blown out of it anyway.

Keeping everything running around here is a full time job, done by a monkey with a poor work ethic and minimal skills. I definitely envy JEP who had an assistant to come in and help with stuff. At least I get some satisfaction from fixing stuff.

And stacking. That’s comforting too.

nick

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Thur. Sept. 10, 2026 – well the week is almost gone already, huh.

By on September 10th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall, march to war

Still hot and humid though. I guess Summer didn’t get the pink slip yet. More of the same is still on the menu for at least a couple of days. Some parts of town seem to have gotten some rain yesterday, but nothing at the house. Houston. Weird little microclimates.

Did my pickups. Well, some of them. Did a trash run while I was out. Then I spent time sorting and packing stuff at the shop for my next auction dropoff.

Had a nice chat with my mom. Her 86th anniversary of her birth was this week. She just bought a house and is mostly done renovating and updating it. The pictures look nice. She says she hopes to get past 100 and I hope so too, as long as her brain and body holds up. She’s from tough old hillbilly stock, without the lifetime of hard labor and alcohol abuse, so she’s got a good chance at it.

Today I’ve got my pickup in Alvin to do. It’s a gift for D2, so I’m kinda motivated. The price was right. Good enough to counter the long drive. Prices in the auctions have been low this last few weeks, after rising a bit for some items. IDK if back to school spending is limiting peoples’ available spending money or if this is a bigger trend as people run out of money in general. I hope it’s just back to school. Otherwise, this holiday spending season is going to be a retail bloodbath.

Gas was $3.69 when I filled up yesterday. That’s a pretty big jump for the holiday week. And my mileage is down enough that I’m wondering if something is wrong with the truck, or if they’ve increased the alcohol in the gas. I only got 16 1/2 mpg this last tank of all highway driving. I used to get around 18 on the highway. I even changed the air filter when I noticed it a week or two ago, and that has improved it a bit. Something to keep an eye on.

So that’s the plan for today, we’ll see how it actually goes.

Stack the tools you need, the supplies you’ll use, and practice the skills…

nick

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Wed. Sept. 9, 2026 – home with stuff to do

By on September 9th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall, lakehouse

Hot still. And crazy humid at the BOL. I’m hoping Houston is a little better. Not counting on it. Yesterday at the BOL it went over 100F and the air was saturated. It was still 88F at 9pm and felt like it. I’ll be happy when Fall arrives. Until I’m too cold…

Did a bunch of stuff yesterday before finally leaving the BOL at 9pm. Look at yesterday’s comments to see how little I actually did…

Today is mostly about pickups. One in Alvin, a couple others scattered around. I could push the Alvin pickup to tomorrow, but IDK if I’ll have any better plan then. I’d like to at least cluster a couple.

And I’ve got other stuff to do today now that I’m home. Kid taxi is one of them. Grrr.

Stacking is easy.

Do it. You know you want to.

nick

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Tues. Sept. 8, 2026 – headed home today after more work

By on September 8th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall, lakehouse

On the plus side, I usually get more done when I’m up here alone. As long as the heat isn’t too bad. Which it probably will be. If yesterday is anything to go by, it was over 100F and saturated. I was sweating just walking in the shade.

Did a bunch of stuff. More ceiling repair. Some work on my arm chair. Various small things around the house. String trimming and branch clearing… W did network and IOT things. Most important was getting the water sensors connected and in place. Under the washing machine, under the A/C unit, and under something else that she picked. They did need 2.4ghz wifi. All low bandwidth, so that’s ok. When I get the ubiquiti stuff set up it will be even easier to segregate them.

Today I’ve got some more outdoor work and cleanup to finish, and we’ll see what else strikes my fancy from the list.

Then it will be back home and back to the school week.

And stacking. There’s still some of that going on.

nick

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Mon. Sept. 7, 2026 – Labor Day

By on September 7th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall, lakehouse

And it will be both hot and humid today. Supposed to be the end of Summer, but here in Texas, Summer hangs around for a bit longer. It wasn’t as hot yesterday, and it cooled off below 80F at night so we are headed in the right direction.

Worked on the ceiling in the living room all afternoon. Got the saggy ceiling reattached. Got a new piece of drywall in place where the fireplace used to be. W did some scraping of popcorn in the kitchen. I’ll do the living room once I have all the drywall firmly attached. So not this trip. I ran out of the washer that keep the screws from pulling through.

I did a few smaller things as I took breaks during the day. Treated the oil stains on the cheap leather chair I bought. We’ll see today if it had any effect on the stains. I also moved stuff around and put stuff away.

Dinner was grilled steaks from 2024 and it was delicious. Choice from Costco is almost as good as Prime from anywhere else. It took longer than I expected for the beef shortage to show up in stores, but I’m glad I jumped the gun a bit and filled the freezers when I did.

Today will be more cleanup of construction debris, maybe some brick work, and definitely some more smaller tasks from the list. Always be working.

And stacking.

nick

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Sun. Sept. 6, 2026 – at the BOL. working.

By on September 6th, 2026 in culture, decline and fall, lakehouse

And it’ll be hot and humid here. The front and the rain might have cooled stuff down a bit, but still hot and humid if the sun is out. Last hurrah of Summer, maybe.

Took most of the day but I eventually loaded up and made it to the BOL. Missed the sunset while dealing with Johnny Law. Pretty minor, so I can’t really complain.

Today we’ll see what needs doing first, and what the weather will allow. I’m sure there will be plenty of stuff to do, and some of it might even be on the list already.

W and D2 made it up last night, so priorities might be reassigned. My strike does not extend to the BOL as everything here benefits me.

Always be working. Entropy never sleeps. Stack so you have something to work with.

nick

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